Abstract(s)

Supporting Family Safety in Minority Collectivist Communities in North America

By Lynda M. Ashbourne, Mohammed Baobaid

This working paper presents a review and critique of current family violence services in a North American context with a view to understanding how these are influenced by individualist assumptions linked to dominant social norms. Many minority-status ethno-cultural communities in North America share more collectivist traditions. We explore the implications of this collectivist orientation for goodness-of-fit between available services and unique family experiences and needs related to family violence. The paper extends current family theory in the area of family violence and collectivist families, and proposes revisions to current practices in order to integrate a cultural understanding more directly.

We propose the Black African feminist à la Awa Thiam to analyze the transcontinental perpetuation of the phenomenon of female genital mutilation (FGM), a harmful traditional practice, among African immigrant families in the United States. The existing FGM theories are broad and not context-specific; hence falling short in giving accurate explanations of FGM in the context of migration. We argue that in order to gain a fuller understanding of FGM with a feminist lens, one has to utilize a culturally relevant feminist theory that examines FGM within contextualized macro level socio-cultural beliefs and practices and within its historical context.